Last night, Bill "The Science Guy"
Nye debated Ken Ham, a noted creationist, over the question: "How
did we get here?" The debate, which took place at Ham's
Creation Museum in Kentucky, lasted nearly two and a half hours and
went about exactly as you'd expect.

Nye, arguing on behalf of science
and education, said Earth was created billions of years ago while Ham, an Evangelical Christian, said God
created Earth about 6,000 years ago, as detailed in Genesis.

Ham
spent most of the debate attempting to reconcile his unscientific
beliefs with his formal training in science.

"Creation is the only viable model of
historical science confirmed by observational science in today's
modern scientific era," Ham said, according to the Associated Press. "I believe the word 'science' has been high-jacked by
secularists."

Uh huh. Nye wasn't buying it, either.

"I just want to remind us all there
are billions of people in the world who are deeply religious, who get
enriched by the wonderful sense of community by their religion,"
Nye said. "But these same people do not embrace the extraordinary
view that the Earth is somehow only 6,000 years old.

"If we continue to eschew science...
we are not going to move forward," he added. "We will not embrace
natural laws. We will not make discoveries. We will not invent and
innovate and stay ahead."

Some scientists criticized Nye for
taking part in the debate, saying it gave credibility and funding to
creationists. "Nye's appearance will be giving money to
organizations who try to subvert the mission Nye has had all his
life: science education, particularly of kids," Jerry Coyne, a
professor of ecology and evolution at the University of Chicago,
wrote on his blog.

The Creation Museum sold out
its 800-seat auditorium for the debate and experienced its best-ever web traffic yesterday, according to Ham.

Coyne also noted that there wasn't much to actually debate, writing: "The issue is settled: evolution is a fact."